The Rising of a New Day by Bill Storie

On our Olderhood Facebook pages we regularly see posts from around the world expressing thanks for a new day. Some folks thank God, some folks are just pleased to see another day in their lives, some people seem blessed.

Whatever your reason for being grateful I have a question for you.

“What are you going to with this new day?”

There’s an old joke where a man’s wife asks him what he is going to do today now that he is retired. “Nothing” he replied. “But you did that yesterday” she responds. “I know, but I didn’t get it finished” he says.

I often wonder if people who are glad of a new day actually do nothing with it. Maybe they are quite happy to watch the grass grow or watch TV all day. Maybe they are quite content to watch YouTube all day or sleep perhaps. If that’s your thing then so be it. But I reckon that if you thank God for granting you a fresh day then it would be courteous to at least do something with it. He made the effort, why won’t you?

I don’t think you need to plan an assault on Everest every day (once a month is more than enough). I don’t think that you need to golf every day – do you know that lots of people spell the word “Retirement” as “G-O-L-F”.

I’m one of those “can’t sit still” people that gets annoyed if I have nothing to do. Watching the sun rise then several hours later watch is set is not high on my Bucket List. There’s probably a word or an acronym for me – “ADD” ; “ADHD”, perhaps, or maybe just simply “N-U-T-S”. I’m sure there are countless experts who will describe my make-up as being anything from normal to obsessive to weird.

I don’t care to be honest.

I’m one of those people who is on Internet constantly. I’m so bad that I can be doing work on Olderhood stuff then in the middle of an important point I have this crazy urge to find out what time it is in Iceland ; or what is the meaning of “parliament” ; or why people in China eat pork ; or where is Kazakhstan. You get the idea.

Random thoughts jump into my head at the strangest times.

I can be in the shower when I want to know why the water goes down anti-clockwise in Australia. So I pop out the shower for a minute to find out. Did I say “Nuts”?

Seriously, I do firmly believe that people need to do something every day. Maybe the same thing, maybe something new, but something. I especially believe this to be true as get older. Keep the mind turning over. I love people who want to learn at any age.

Apart from the mental benefits of learning (keeps the mind sharp) there is just an inherent notion that learning new things is a great adventure. I may never use the new-found knowledge certainly, but if I have learned something new I feel satisfied that this has been a worthwhile day. If I go to bed at night not having learned something new I don’t sleep well (hmm, I don’t sleep well anyway, so bang goes that theory).

If we all promise to learn something new each and every day I reckon we can raise the IQ of the world by several points.

So, that’s my new mission – encouraging people, the Olderhood Family and everyone else, to make a point, a determined effort in fact, to actively find out about something you have no idea about and be random about it.

Next week I’ll ask you what time it is in Iceland – then we can compare notes.